In the
Jan./Feb. 2004 issue of Mother Jones, Mark Dowie recounts how Dr. Stuart
Newman decided to test the willingness of the US Patent Office...

Newman
applied for a patent to create a chimera, a monster.

The
application was turned down. Newman pushed his claim to see how far he
could go, and the Patent Office remained firm. Newman wanted to raise
awareness of what some genetics scientists were willing to do—and
how wrong it would be to allow it.

Dowie
writes: “Newman's patent application is for an intriguing biotechnological
contrivance called a chimera [ki-mir-a]. According to Greek mythology,
a chimera was a part-lion, part-goat, part-serpent creature that terrorized
Lycia until it was slain by the hero Bellerophon. If biotech continues
to run amok, warns Newman, such inventions of legend and allegory could
actually be invented.

“A
biological chimera is a way to hybridize two or more species that won't
cross sexually. The exact results are largely unpredictable except for
the certainty that the chimera will contain cells of each species proportionate
to the numbers placed in the embryo. A creature made from an equal number
of cells from two species could look like one species but contain the
genes, organs, and intelligence of the other.

“Newman
[sought] to patent 'chimeric embryos and animals containing human cells'...taken
to its most extreme but not necessarily impossible end, the technology
could be used to manufacture soldiers with armadillolike shielding, quasi-human
astronauts engineered for long-range space travel, and altered primates
with enough cognitive ability to ride a bus, follow basic instructions,
pick crops in 119 degrees, or descend into a mine shaft without worrying
their silly little heads about inalienable human rights and the resulting
laws and customs that demand safe working conditions.”

Well,
three years earlier, as reported in The Telegraph (Sep.27, 2001, “Boy's
DNA implanted in rabbit eggs,” written by Roger Highfield), scientists
had begun to walk down that road:

“Scientists
in China have inserted a boy's DNA into empty rabbit eggs and grown hybrid
embryos, it is reported today. A team at the Sun Yat-Sen University of
Medical Sciences, Guangzhou, are trying to overcome a practical limitation...Today's
issue of Nature reports [about]...Dr Chen Xigu at Sun Yat-Sen...In some
of the 100 or so successful transfers to a rabbit egg stripped of chromosomes,
an embryo developed to the morula stage, the compact ball of cells that
forms after about three days of development. For stem cells to be isolated,
the embryos must be coaxed into developing further. In Britain, the Government
plans to ban the creation of hybrids.”

Also
in 2001, there was another ambitious experiment:

BBC
Online (May 4, 2001): “Scientists have confirmed that the first
genetically altered humans have been born and are healthy.

“Up
to 30 such children have been born, 15 of them as a result of one experimental
programme at a US laboratory...

“Genetic
fingerprint tests on two one-year-old children confirm that they contain
a small quantity of additional genes not inherited from either parent.

“The
additional genes were taken from a healthy donor and used to overcome
their mother's infertility problems.

“...The additional genes that the children carry have altered their
'germline', or their collection of genes that they will pass on to their
offspring...[Note: This means the new abnormal configuration of genes
will spread out into the general population, over time, with unknown effects.]

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“Writing
in the journal Human Reproduction, the researchers say that this 'is the
first case of human germline genetic modification resulting in normal
healthy children.'”

The
superhighway into a genetically designed future isn't just a science-fiction
fantasy. Stones on that highway have already been laid down.

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Jon
Rappoport has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years. Nominated
for a Pulitzer Prize early in his career, Jon has published articles on
medical fraud, politics, alternative health, and sports in LA Weekly,
CBS Healthwatch, Spin, Stern, and other magazines and newspapers in the
US and Europe.

He
is the is author of several books, including The Secret Behind Secret
Societies and The Magic Agent (a novel).

Jon
is the author of a new course for home schoolers, LOGIC AND ANALYSIS.